Men's Tennis goes 1-1 over weekend

A weekend trip to Maine left the men's tennis team back where it started, with a .500 record. The team split its weekend matches with a 2-5 loss to the Bowdoin Polar Bears on Friday and a 7-0 win over the Colby White Mules on Saturday.

On Saturday, Tufts was determined to beat the Mules and end its four match losing streak. This resolve started out in singles with a dominating victory by senior co-captain David Ruttenberg, 6-1, 6-2, with sophomore Rifat Perahya following suit with another straight set victory, 6-2, 6-2. Junior Jon Bram, senior co-captain Danny Lang, and junior Adam Yates all cruised through their matches, each winning in straight sets, 7-6 6-0, 6-3, 7-6(6), and 6-3, 6-2 respectively.

Sixth seeded freshman Ben Alexander had a little more trouble against Colby sophomore John Fallon, but came out on fire in the third set to take the match, 6-3, 3-6, 6-0. The win extended his team-best singles record to 7-1. While Tufts took the doubles point with wins by the number one team of Ruttenberg/Perahya (8-4) and number three Bram/Jon Rubenstein (8-6), the Mules got their only win of the match as Colby's number two doubles team stole a 9-8 victory over Lang and Yates.

Ruttenberg said the team must build off its win over Colby.

"Staying positive is the only thing we need to do," he said, "All we are concerned with right now is making regionals."

The Jumbos squared off on Friday against the Polar Bears in Brunswick, ME, with Perahya and freshman Ben Alexander continuing to be the team's most consistent players. Perahya won a three set match in the number two spot, 6-2, 1-6, 6-4, to improve his record to 5-2 and Alexander won at the sixth spot, 7-5, 2-6, 7-5, to earn himself a 6-1 record.

Ruttenberg lost a close number one singles match 7-5, 6-4 while Bram lost at number three, 7-5, 6-3. Lang and Yates both went down at the four and five seeds, 6-1, 6-2, and 6-2, 6-2 respectively.

The Jumbos did not fare any better in doubles against Bowdoin. The Polar Bears took the doubles point with a 3-0 sweep, winning the matches 8-2, 8-4, and 8-5 as they handed Tufts another loss.

The team can lock up a spot in the regional tournament with wins over two NESCAC opponents over the next two days. The Jumbos will play a home match today against Trinity and a match tomorrow away at Amherst.

"We should win the next two and get into regionals," Ruttenberg said. "We should definitely win. We are a better team than both Trinity and Amherst."

Coach Jim Watson wants his team to get sufficient rest going in to its third and fourth matches in seven days. The Trinity match was rescheduled from last weekend, meaning that Watson thinks his team may be tired by the time it gets to Amherst.

"The drawback [to rescheduling the Trinity match] is that we play Trinity at home and turn around and go to Amherst the next day," Watson said.

He also commented that the frenetic pace of the team's schedule may have lead to defeats at Middlebury and Williams.

Should the team qualify for the tournament, Ruttenberg feels that it is very optimistic of its chances.

"We can beat every team in the East. The top two teams are MIT and Middlebury and we only lost to both of them 4-3. We just have to turn one match around to win both and make Nationals," Ruttenburg said.